Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 122, Nos. 3 & 4. Whole Nos. 745 & 746, September/October 2003

The woman standing in the doorway was the kind you dreamt about at two in the afternoon, when the heat of the steaming asphalt felt as if it would boil the flesh right off you. When the rake you were using to smooth down the blacktop felt as if it was made of pig iron, you started to imagine where you’d rather be. Usually anywhere would do. For Thomas it was always with a woman like this one: curvy, slender, dark hair to her shoulders with a wisp of it falling across one dark eye.

She moved from the doorway into the bar. Thomas recalled a line from a cheap detective novel he’d read once: “She walked the way money would if it had legs.” He had always liked the line, purple though it was. Now he knew what it meant. Halfway to the bar, she turned and looked at Thomas. Her gaze was direct and confident. It didn’t faze her a bit, Thomas realized, being in here and being ogled by men who had not been socialized to pretend they weren’t staring.

“I’m looking for someone who wants to do a job,” she said. Her voice had a hint of that smoke-and-whiskey sound that suddenly made a jazz song start playing in Thomas’s head.

“We’re all working men, here,” he said.

She looked around and then back at him with an amused smile. “Working on what?” she asked. “Your fifth beer?”

Thomas shrugged. “It’s a union thing.”

“Then perhaps I’m in the wrong place. I need someone non-union.”

She and Thomas looked at one another steadily. Finally Thomas said, “I don’t mind being a scab.”

Sitting at the bar, Thomas had another beer. She perched on the stool next to him and looked perfectly at home. Up close, it didn’t take long to realize that her style and self-assurance were learned. She could walk into a place like this, no sweat, because she’d done it before. More than once, Thomas reckoned.

“So tell me about the job.”

She sipped some kind of colored drink that she’d had to coach the bartender on how to make. “First, tell me, if you don’t mind scabbing, are you prepared to do something illegal?”

Thomas smiled and shook his head. “I knew it had to be something like that,” he said. “You’ve got yourself the wrong boy, darling. If you want to lead some poor sap around by his pecker and get him so dewy-eyed that he thinks you love him, and then get him to whack your old man so you can make off with the money, that’s your business. But I’m not so naive, baby, not by a long chalk.” He slipped off the barstool. It was too bad. She was good-looking, all right. He started walking back to where Pig Eye and Larry sat, still watching, Pig Eye still silent.

“I admire your ethics,” the woman said. “But you misunderstand me.”

He turned back to her. “Do I?”

“Yes. It’s nothing nearly so melodramatic. I need to have a large deck and hot-tub enclosure built. And I want someone who’s prepared to do it without bothering about a building permit.” She smiled pleasantly. “I’m prepared to pay well. But if that will compromise your morality, I understand.”

Thomas was very clear in his own mind on what he would and would not do. He had always thought building permits for jobs like that were stupid. “How much?” he asked.

“How do I know you’ll do good work?”

Thomas pointed over to Pig Eye and Larry, sitting side by side, slack-jawed. “They’re my references. In fact, if the job’s big enough, you may want both of them, too.”

“Are they relatives of yours?”

“No, just associates.”

She shook her head. “I only have the budget for one.”

“It’s me, then. What’s the address?”

She gave him the details about where to be when, and when he asked for an advance, she hesitated only briefly before handing him one hundred dollars. “My name’s Mary,” she said. “I’ll see you on Tuesday.”

Thomas went back to his friends. “I got a little job,” he said. “Take me a week, tops.”

Pig Eye was finally ready to talk again. “Woman like that? Take you more than a week. I knew a woman looked like that once. Getting over her took me a lifetime.”

“Yeah, well.” Thomas did not wish to get Pig Eye started on recounting his romantic entanglements. He dropped fifty dollars on the table. “Get yourselves laid, boys. On me.” As he headed for the door he figured that was not how the money would be spent, but at least his heart was in the right place. He went back to his room, hoping nobody was in the shared bathroom so he could shower and shave.

Mary lived in exactly the kind of house that Thomas had imagined. It was a large stone place with a curved drive and it took almost two minutes to walk from the road to the front door. Mature trees shrouded the house from the street. Thomas had bought himself a watch with part of the other fifty to make sure he was on time. He liked to be punctual, and prided himself on his ability to keep time in his head. He got the sense, however, that the margin for error on this job was thin, and the money was too good to risk.

Thomas expected some butler from central casting to answer the door and was surprised when Mary did.

“Jeeves have the day off?” he asked.

“I don’t believe in servants,” she said.